


One-Man Crusade

by NoisyNoiverns



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-26
Updated: 2013-12-26
Packaged: 2018-01-06 01:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1100875
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoisyNoiverns/pseuds/NoisyNoiverns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Work with the Finns," they said. "Make them be Christians," they said. "It'll be easy," they said.</p>
<p>Damn liars, the lot of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One-Man Crusade

Sven didn't know how he'd let himself get talked into leaving his comfortable home in Sweden to traverse the Finnish wilderness trying to convince the locals to convert to Christianity. It was too hard for a man of his station. He wasn't even a priest. But his area was a bit understaffed on that end, so anybody not a serf or peasant or what-have-you was given a location and an order to go spread the Word. But whoever had sent the order out clearly had never worked with the Finns.

Oh, some of them had come along quite easily. They'd been led along like sheep and were living peacefully in the makeshift village that had been set up for them. Almost half the tribe were practicing Christians, to the local priest's delight. Said priest, a rather energetic fellow by the name of Gunnolf, accredited the new converts all to Sven's presence, but Sven wasn't so sure. Mainly because of the Finns who _hadn't_ converted.

The remaining pagans, including the tribe's leader and his innermost circle, clung stubbornly to their gods. And after getting a mere glimpse of the leader, a fearsome little monster with an empty socket where his right eye should be, Sven was all for letting them keep their ways. He had no desire to get any closer to the one-eyed man than absolutely necessary. If he had his way, "absolutely necessary" would equal him going back to Sweden and never, ever laying eyes on the Finn again.

Gunnolf had other ideas.

"Sven, please," the priest pleaded, running his hand through his hair for the millionth time in an hour. "I _know_ you can do it. I know they're intimidating, but so are you, so surely they'll listen to you!"

Sven sighed. "I doubt it. Gunnolf, you've seen those people. No, they're not even people, they're hardly more than animals! They shun the converts, torment them, even. You've seen it, I know you have. They're terrible little beasts who won't listen to reason."

Gunnolf fidgeted in his seat. "That's true," he conceded, "but that's no reason to give up! I'm sure we can convince them with a little more work!"

Sven let out another sigh. There was just no discouraging this man. "I'll see what I can do, Gunnolf. But I'm not making any promises. I'm telling you, you can't reason with those people. We'd be better off just keeping the ones we've saved and killing the ones who refuse to be."

Gunnolf's face fell. "We can't kill them just yet. We just haven't tried hard enough, is all. I just _know_  we can save these people, Sven. And you're going to help the whole way. I have faith in you. God sent you to me, I know he did."

Sven was silent for a moment, then pushed away from the table they'd been conferring over and stood. "I wish I had your faith, Gunnolf. I truly do. Let me know if you think of anything that might help."

"Of course." Gunnolf nodded, back to smiling.

Sven nodded to him and left the room, stretching. He could do with some fresh air, he decided. Staying inside conducting business all day made his head hurt.

The moment he stepped outside, he froze as a bored drawl reached his ears.

"You Swedes. So high and mighty. What, you think you're better than us Finns, just because you believe in one god instead of many? How pretentious of you."

Sven looked around quickly, searching for the source of the voice. It trilled, "Look up, stupid!" and laughed a high, manic cackle.

When Sven did what the voice said, his blood ran cold.

A diminuitive figure dropped down from the lower branches of a birch and stalked toward him. It hissed, "I don't appreciate being called a beast, Swede," just as Sven managed to tear his eyes away from the gaping black hole in the figure's face.

Sven took a step back, brow furrowing into a scowl. "You." He hoped he sounded braver than he felt. It was a bit hard to be brave when you were face-to-face with a man who, if what the converts had told him was true, had taken an arrow to the eye and, rather than let it heal, simply ripped it out and burned the socket to stop the bleeding.

The man smirked, and Sven couldn't help but watch as muscle and skin folded over the socket, making the look ten times more sinister than it was probably meant to be. "Me." The Finn started to circle Sven, hands clasped behind his back and keeping his single gray eye turned to look at Sven. "You're scared."

"I am not."

"You are too." The man chuckled. "Your mouth should probably talk to the rest of your body. Your shoulders are tense, your legs are bent slightly, your back is a little curved, and your weight is resting on the balls of your feet. Typical body language of a man debating whether to punch me or run away." When all Sven could respond with was a stare, the man laughed. "I'm not a leader because I can stand the most pain, O Brilliant Swedish Savior. I know you think we're all a bunch of savages, but believe it or not, we are, in fact, intelligent enough to know the leader should be able to read people."

Sven growled under his breath and snapped, "How much did you hear? You were obviously listening."

The man shrugged. "Most of it. I didn't start actually listening until I heard you refer to my people as, oh, what was it now... Ah yes, you called us 'little more than animals,' I believe. Is that right?" He waved a hand, as if it didn't really matter. "You really should keep the window closed if you're going to have that kind of conversation. The forest has ears."

Sven gritted his teeth and hissed out through them, "What do you want?"

"You to leave, but we both know that's about as likely as a deer killing itself for us to eat. So I'll settle for this: Meet me tomorrow at high noon. I'll even make it easy for you and come back here to your pretty little house. And we'll strike a deal. How does that sound?"

Sven grumbled. "About as good as I'm going to get." Every instinct was screaming at him to run away from this creepy, unnatural little one-eyed man, but said creepy, unnatural little one-eyed man was also the enemy leader, and he refused to show weakness in front of him.

The man's lips peeled back in an unholy mix of a grimace and a smile. "So we have an appointment. Remember, high noon. Don't forget, pretty boy."

The man spun around and bounded back into the safety of the forest, and Sven was left staring after the waving brown hair that was the last of him to vanish, thinking about how much work he had to do just to make a deal with a crazy one-eyed savage.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is shorter than I thought it would be oops the next chapter will probably be longer


End file.
